


crooked dreams will always glow

by SyntheticRevenge



Category: Rusty Quill Gaming (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Infection, M/M, Oscar Wilde Is Fine (Rusty Quill Gaming), Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Set in the 18 months between seasons, Sleep Deprivation, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-14
Updated: 2021-03-16
Packaged: 2021-03-21 20:42:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,963
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30027582
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SyntheticRevenge/pseuds/SyntheticRevenge
Summary: Moments with Wilde, Zolf, Barnes and Carter from the 18 months between seasons--they're not alright on their own, but together, they might get there eventually.
Relationships: Commander James Barnes & Oscar Wilde (Rusty Quill Gaming), Zolf Smith/Oscar Wilde
Comments: 6
Kudos: 32





	1. Exhaustion

**Author's Note:**

> I am _obsessed_ with these lads and/or blokes and have terminal brainrot so I just wanted to start an ao3 fic to post all the various oneshots I write about them. Hope you enjoy <3
> 
> CW: sleep deprivation, poor self-care, referenced eating issues/weight loss

Wilde’s been awake forty-five hours before someone notices. Longer than he expected. Maybe that was self-centered, they  _ are _ trying to save the world, there are more important things to pay attention to than someone transposing the occasional word in stressful conversations.

Oh well. Maybe all the  _ Wilde’s fine stop asking _ really set in and he’s finally managed to convince them without even trying all that hard. Regardless, Barnes notices first. Not a hard thing to miss, really. Wilde’s trying to read a coded letter from Curie, and it could be the simplest code in the world, but his mind won’t stick to any part of it. He starts to slide it into place, and then it leaps out of reach. 

He needs to fucking sleep. Or...or he could cast Comprehend Languages, which he does, and he thinks it’s subtle, but it’s actually quite loud because he blacks out for a moment in the middle and falls forward before catching himself on the desk with a clatter. 

Barnes’s sword is leveled on him by the time he blinks out of the daze and looks up, and he gasps softly.

“Strip,” Barnes says, and Wilde tries to figure out what this could possibly  _ be _ .

“Wh--” he starts, mind stumbling over some bad joke, but Barnes doesn’t let him stagger to the inevitably dulled point.

“Something’s wrong with you. Need to see your veins.”

“Right,” Wilde says, blinking. “R-right. I. Yes.”

“Inclined to believe you’re fine, since you haven’t left, but, y’know. Due diligence.” Barnes is perfectly straight-backed and composed and Wilde feels a swell of pride that his men ( _ his _ men--presumptuous but true-feeling) are so on top of things. 

He tries to unbutton his shirt, but his hands shake horrifically. He shouldn’t have let things go this long, but he was  _ working _ , and it was hard to tear himself away. Hard to--hard to  _ want _ to cut himself back off from magic. It’s like he can finally hear music again after a long, long spell of deafening silence. Like there’s color in the world again. That’s worth the lack of sleep.

He imagines what Grizzop would say if he told him that, and almost smiles, and then remembers, and stops. 

He keeps working on the shirt. It’s slow going. He probably looks deeply pathetic--he  _ does _ , actually, he knows it, can tell by the only lightly-masked pity on Barnes’s face. The sword doesn’t waver, though, pointed straight at his heart. 

He manages to get his shirt off eventually, and turns around, dizziness immediately enveloping him. Barnes grunts.

“Clear,” he says, and Wilde feels a swell of relief, even though he knows he’s not infected--well, does anyone  _ know _ ? If it eats at the mind, do the victims even--but that isn’t worth thinking about, not in the state he’s in. “Trousers too.”

“James,” Wilde breathes, a plea for mercy and understanding that he immediately curses himself for. Barnes is doing the right thing.

Barnes adjusts his grip on the sword. “Sorry, boss.”

“No,” Wilde sighs. “No, you’re right.” Getting his trousers off is easier, and he does another dizzying spin, trying not to look down at himself. He avoids himself in mirrors. Lately he’s been shockingly gaunt. Barely recognizable. Every rip pops out, his spine a bony ridge. 

“Alright,” Barnes says, dropping the sword. Wilde dresses again, slowly, trying not to collapse, because his ego wouldn’t be able to take it. “What’s wrong with you, then?”

“Nothing,” Wilde says, with a tight-lipped smile, leaving his shirt unbuttoned and open because he can’t summon the energy to fix it. “I’m fine.”

“Yeah, that only works for so long,” Barnes says.

“Truly, I’m--”

“I’m getting Zolf,” Barnes says, turning to leave, and Wilde lunges forward, managing to catch his wrist without knocking himself off balance entirely.

“ _ Don’t _ ,” Wilde hisses, and Barnes turns back around, eyebrows raised. “Just--I’ll handle myself. Zolf--Zolf doesn’t need to--I’m  _ fine _ .”

“No, you’re not,” Barnes says. “And you need to be, for the sake of the fucking world. So I’m getting Zolf.”

“I can--I can easily fix this. I just need to sleep. And--and I  _ can _ , I just have to--”

“I’m not interested,” Barnes says, gently pulling out of Wilde’s grip. “You need someone who knows how to help you, and that’s not me, and it sure as hell isn’t Carter.”

“I don’t know, Carter’s quite adept at sleeping despite overwhelming odds, maybe he could pass on his knowledge,” Wilde says, surprised at the coherence with which that came out of him. Casually insulting Carter seems to be second nature.

“Yeah. Funny.” Barnes gives Wilde a flat look. “I’m still getting Zolf, though.”

“Fine,” Wilde sighs. “If he gets so annoyed he kills me, my blood is on your hands.”

“I don’t think one more person’s blood on my hands is gonna be the thing that does me in,” Barnes says, tone detached, and it’s a striking and concerning statement that Wilde would want to probe if he could hold anything in his mind for longer than a moment. “Sit down. You look like you’re gonna pass out.”

“I, uh--” Wilde says, and before he can find an actual response, Barnes puts hands on his shoulders and half-pushes, half-guides him back into a chair. 

“Don’t go anywhere.”

“I don’t think I can,” Wilde says, with a grimace. “If you--honestly, if you have any spare restoratives, I should be--”

Barnes walks out without acknowledging him speaking, and Wilde sighs, squeezing his eyes shut and rubbing his temples to shut off the occasional disorienting flash in his vision. He shouldn’t have let it get this bad. He shouldn’t have let this happen at all.

_ Let it happen _ implies that he didn’t invite it, that he didn’t sit on the edge of his bed and stare at his banded ankles and think, with a sickening, excited headrush, that he could take them off, just for a bit.

Stupid. It was stupid. He was stupid. Missed his old self too fucking much. Missed dazzling and effortless and lush and snarky. Pushed out all of the downsides and just focused on how much  _ better _ he could be, and now here he is again, strung out on sleeplessness and leaden-tongued.

Zolf snaps him out of his self-critical daze with a “What the fuck did you do this time” that sounds as concerned as it does irritated, which is almost heartening.

“Before you get into the shouting bit, please take into account that I am likely going to remember none of what you say,” Wilde says, suppressing a sad yawn. “My brain isn’t interested in accepting new memories at present.”

“Well, I’m not--interested in--” Zolf starts to snap, then sighs, shaking his head. “Oscar, what’s going on. Is it--drugs, or--”

Wilde laughs, breathlessly. “Is magic a drug? I think that depends on who you ask.”

“Magic--” Zolf cuts himself off, eyes hardening from worried into genuinely angry, and he drops to his knees and pulls up the legs of Wilde’s trousers, revealing his bare ankles. “You  _ idiot _ .”

“Believe me, I know.”

“You absolute  _ fool _ , Oscar Wilde.” Zolf stands again. “What, did you think it would all be  _ better _ ? What were you  _ thinking _ ?”

“I was thinking that I missed how things used to be,” Wilde says, and he finds himself choked up, the exhaustion overwhelming him. 

“Yeah, we all do!” Zolf shouts. “Everything’s gone to shit, but--but you keep  _ trying _ , you don’t just--just run back to--” He sighs, rubbing his face with both hands. “Where are the cuffs, Oscar.”

“They’re on my bedside table,” Wilde says, any fight drained completely out of him. “I just...I wanted to be myself again.”

Zolf’s breath catches. “You’re always you. Magic or not, idiot or not, dead-fuckin’-tired or not. You don’t just stop being you because things get shit. I think--I mean, I guess I don’t know, maybe I don’t really know you, but I think you’ve probably been more yourself over the last few months than you were when I met you.”

“No, you know me,” Wilde breathes. “You...you’re right. Even if I don’t want you to be.”

“Why wouldn’t you want me to be right? You’re a leader, Oscar, you...you’re inspiring people, you’re  _ helping _ , it’s…” Zolf sighs again. “You serve my new god just as well as I do, y’know that? I know I wouldn’t have hope if it weren’t for you, so.”

“Oh,” Wilde says. His mind clouds and he can’t find a better response than that, so he just blinks.

“You’re absolutely fried, aren’t you,” Zolf says, flatly, and Wilde nods. “Right. Let’s get you to bed, then.”

He pulls Wilde to his feet and supports him the best he can despite the height difference, dragging Wilde into his room and throwing him on his bed, finding the cuffs and reattaching them to Wilde’s ankles. They’re cold against his bare skin, and the second they snap on, Wilde shudders as that beautiful, intangible layer of reality slides away from him again. 

“Zolf,” he hears himself say, as sleep starts dragging him down with dark, heavy hands.

“Yeah?” 

“Stay with me?”

“Oh,” Zolf says, and Wilde feels his weight as he sits down on the bed. “Uh. You sure?”

“Yes. Please.”

“Okay.”


	2. Reintroduction

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so this doesn't have Carter or Barnes, but I wanted to write it and it feels like it fits in this...loose collection of timeskip content, so. Here.
> 
> CW: implied/referenced alcohol abuse

Zolf wakes up in the nicest room he’s ever been in, short of--well, short of Paris. Thinking about Paris makes a dull, nauseous ache spike through him, though that might just be the brutal, soul-killing hangover coming on. 

He has no idea where he is. He knows he should stand up and figure it out, but if he moves he knows everything’s going to get so much worse, and he doesn’t wanna vomit on the nice wood floors. So he stays in the warm, comfortable bed, and curls on his side and tries to go back to sleep, hoping he’s miraculously welcome wherever this is and no one’s gonna evict or kill him any time soon.

His sleep is shallow and disorienting. He dreams about waking up. Dreams about an empty, endless mansion. Dreams about the ocean. Dreams about a wave that crests into a hand that reaches out to him and--

He wakes up sweaty and ill and exhausted and this time he can’t stop himself from puking on the floor. Rubs his face and mutters  _ fuck _ and doesn’t make any effort to get up and clean it.

“What a lovely reintroduction,” someone says tightly from the end of his bed, and he doesn’t even have the presence of mind to be surprised. He keeps one eye shut and turns the other towards the voice.

Oscar Wilde, in the flesh. His hair is short. Military short. It’s a startling, severe look that doesn’t suit him at all. He looks stern and sad and angry and closed-off all at once.

“Where am I?” Zolf asks, and Wilde sighs.

“I knew you wouldn’t remember, yet I remain disappointed, somehow,” he says. “Cairo.”

“Yeah, remembered that bit,” Zolf says, even though he did actually maybe think he was still in Marrakesh. “Where specifically.”

“The al-Tahan mansion,” Wilde says, lips twisting in a tight expression that isn’t quite a smile or a grimace.

“Wh--Hamid?” Zolf asks, and a sickening combination of anxiety and excitement and guilt flood him. “You--Hamid’s here?”

Wilde inhales sharply. “Ah. No.”

“Then…”

“You weren’t aware of the Harlequin base in Cairo?” 

“I was aware that there  _ was _ one,” Zolf says. “Didn’t know it was my friend’s family’s mansion, though.”

“Well. Here you are,” Wilde says. 

“What’s a meritocratic handler doing at a Harlequin base?” Zolf asks, though he doesn’t particularly care about the answer.

“I left the meritocracy,” Wilde says, with another tight almost-smile.

“Jumping off a sinking ship?”

“I actually jumped before it became apparent just how many holes there were.”

“And what about the rest of ‘em?” Zolf asks. “Sasha and Hamid. They come with you to the Harlequins, or--”

“Zolf, there’s no easy way to tell you this, but I need to, because every time you say one of their names I briefly feel my chest shut,” Wilde says, not meeting Zolf’s eyes. 

Zolf feels the pit of his stomach drop out, and nausea churns violently. He doesn’t vomit again, but it’s a near thing, and he desperately wants to be less sober than he is for whatever Wilde’s gonna say next. “All dead?” he asks, flatly.

“Not--not necessarily,” Wilde says, but he’s quiet. “They...disappeared. In Rome.”

“In--why’d you let them go to bloody  _ Rome _ ?” Zolf snaps, sitting up properly, a hit of rage bringing some of his energy back. “Weren’t you supposed to be looking out for them?”

“Their families were kidnapped and taken there, and--” Wilde shakes his head and sighs. “And I was in no fit state to stop them.”

“Why? Why didn’t you do your fucking  _ job _ ?”

“As if you have the right to ask me that,” Wilde snaps, eyes bright with cold anger. 

“I left for a good reason, and--” Zolf shouts, and then the weight crushes his lungs and he can’t get any more words out. He left, and they’re dead. He was their leader, their--their healer, their--and he left them, and he’ll never have the chance to make it up to any of them. The last time he saw them they were hurt and upset with him and--and that’s the last image of them he’ll ever have.

“If I bear responsibility, you do as well,” Wilde says, voice low and rough. “But I would prefer to shut that out and believe neither of us do, because I have a good deal of work to do, and I need to be able to live with myself to do it.”

Zolf takes a long, shallow, shuddering breath. “Why’m I here.”

“What an existential question.” Wilde’s voice is flat and sarcastic and Zolf would probably slap him if he could move. “To suffer, it seems.”

“You’re a fucking posh prick of an uncaring incompetent cunt, Oscar Wilde.”

“Oh, Zolf, don’t hold back, tell me how you really feel,” Wilde says, with a pained but accepting smirk. “As you are, at present, a washed-up angry guilt-sick faithless drunk, I’ll take your criticisms with a grain or two of salt."

Zolf can’t help but laugh at the bluntness of the strike. “Fair enough,” he says, because nothing Wilde said was untrue.

“You’re here because I need a crew to help me save the world,” Wilde says, settling into a semi-rehearsed ease. Zolf manages to forget he’s a performer until he’s performing, somehow, even though he probably always is. “You’ve heard about the infection?”

Zolf probably has heard about an infection, but nothing comes to mind. He’s made it his business not to remember a damned thing lately. Only so much any dwarf can take before his back breaks. He doesn’t feel the need to lie to Wilde. He owes the man nothing.

“If I have, I’ve forgotten,” he says, and Wilde inhales, nodding, eyes darting off.

“Right. Well. That’s the first order of business, then,” Wilde says, briefly biting his bottom lip in thought. “Zolf, you’re here because I respect you. I respect all of you for what you accomplished in Paris, but you--you were their leader. They looked up to you.”

“It didn’t do any fucking good.”

“No,” Wilde says, laughing breathlessly. “It certainly didn’t. But that’s the world’s fault, not yours. You saw an injustice, and a threat to sentient life, and you acted. I need people like you. I don’t know if things  _ can _ be fixed, but we at least have to try.”

“Can we have a drink with the rest of this conversation?” Zolf asks, rubbing his face.

“As much as it pains me to say this, no,” Wilde says. “I need you a good bit more functional than you seem to be at the moment.”

“I don’t know what use I am to you,” Zolf says, voice cracking involuntarily. “I’m a cleric without a god.”

“You have incredible intuition, and a damn good arm for stabbing,” Wilde says. “If you happen to pick up a new god along the way, well. Icing on the cake.”

“I don’t--I don’t know if I can...believe...anymore,” Zolf says. His eyes sting. “I don’t really know what’s left.”

“Oh, then you’ll  _ love _ hearing about the infection,” Wilde says. “Zolf, look. I’m not going to tell you things are bright. But the world is  _ rife _ with possibility. You can drink yourself to death, or you can go out there and fucking save it. If everything’s so goddamned terrible, Mr. Smith, then come with me and fix it.”

“I can’t fix anything.”

“You owe it to our friends to try. You  _ know _ they would,” Wilde says.

“You doing this for them?” Zolf asks, softly.

“I’m doing it because it’s the right thing to do.” Wilde sighs, blinks a few times quickly. “But I couldn’t tell you I didn’t think about Sasha or Hamid’s righteous outrage if I didn’t do anything.”

“Gods, the high note Hamid would hit,” Zolf says, and absurdly gets choked up.

Wilde snorts, an undignified and endearing sound that brings an involuntary smile to Zolf’s face. “I would imagine it but I’d prefer not to.”

“You said there’s a chance they’re still alive?” Zolf asks, swallowing hard.

“Like I said. The world is rife with possibility. Tip the odds in your favor. Unfortunately, we do have priorities, and the infection is number one at present,” Wilde says.

“Right. Might as well tell me about it.”

“Try not to break anything or cry in despair until after I’ve finished my explanation,” Wilde says, eyes almost dancing.

“I’ll do my very best,” Zolf deadpans, and Wilde begins.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! All feedback is greatly appreciated <3  
> Find me on tumblr @williammatagot


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